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From time to time I link to or quote an article that seems to explain something that is going on in this country or abroad, something that resonates with me.
So this morning, I draw your attention to a column in the NewStatesman, Britain’s current affairs and political magazine. It doesn’t cover everything about Brexit (for instance there is nothing about the poor turnout of millennials who ‘backed’ the Remain side of the ballot – Brexit Is What Happens When Millennials Don’t Vote), but it does explain and react to some of what has occurred in the United Kingdom.
Don’t many of us, no matter our political views, feel “hiraeth“? That’s the Welsh word that roughly translates as a deep desire for home, “a home you can never return to, a home which may never have existed at all.”
See Laurie Penny’s I Want My Country Back, published yesterday in the NewStatesman.
Anon-2 said:
Well, she has lots of insults to hurl around, little else. This country she envisions? They’d throw her hateful behind out! I’m sure she misses the irony….
Land Wayland said:
The danger of democracy and the wide-spread right to vote is that there are often far more ignorant (not stupid) and emotional (not crazy) people who go to the polls than those who have some grasp of the issues and the mental stability to make long-term decisions. Usually, their leaders, who are well aware of the dangers of the shotgun randomness of voting, make sure that the issues are narrowly drawn and the public can’t do much danger beyond, as the author noted, shooting the country in the foot. But this time a non-existent Labour party and a mob-mongering Conservative leader failed and Britain has opened the door to the new world, and discovered that the promised yellow-brick road to OZ is much more likely to be a 200-foot dive into an empty lake.
A small ray of hope: Disentanglement from the EU is a two-year process, and there is hope that British Common Sense may yet prevail. You who have ears, take heed for the same appeal is being made to the ignorant and emotional in these United States. They are being told that they are supposed to be angry at something and although they don’t know why or what, they are being encouraged to vote for change, any change, quick change, big change, small change, any kind of change, just as long as it is change.
Anon-2 said:
Sounds like the 2008 election…and the following 8 years……emotional and ignorant describes the author of the article…… and the current administration.
The UK, being the largest foreign investor in the US, will thrive on it’s own. It will take some time to disentangle, true, as article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty will be invoked….
A bad day for statists……and a great day for freedom.
Julie said:
Richard, thanks for posting this wonderful reflection. What a terrific writer and great person M. Penney is!
And…who is the coward behind anon?! Your blog is exceeding its original audience- how exciting!
Julie said:
oops, I meant ‘Penny’
Anon-2 said:
I told Richard long ago that if several of my friends who read this blog knew I was a conservative, they’d de-friend me. Such is the state of the tolerant left.
He allows me to post, as long as my comments are respectful. Apparently, you can be disrespectful if you post your name. You’re not the first person to insult me here; yet had you argued my points….you’d be the first. Funny how that works…..
http://www.wsj.com/articles/whos-the-xenophobe-now-1467069652